Tutorial: Leveling
Overview This is a guide to leveling your ship girls effectively through sorties. Experience (XP) increases the level of ships, which leads to increased Evasion, LOS, ASW, and accuracy (passively). Leveling ships can also unlock remodels at higher levels. Suggested places to level *'2-2': [Base XP: 150-200, Node(s): B'''] For new players who want a mostly safe option for leveling. Only requirement is at least 3 CV(L) to guarantee routing. 2 transport kills per run, and a bauxite node at A to help recoup costs. *3-5: [Base XP: '''300, Node(s): B'''] Similar to old 3-2A but with bucket usage. Bring a CLT or CV(L) to guarantee routing. Put your leveling target as flag and run as many opening strikes as you can. Running a submarine will "taunt" 4/6 ships. *4-5: [Base XP: '''170-210, Node(s): D/F] This is the map to level ASW ships or a leeching CA and it is also very cheap to run. When running a flagship that can ASW give them either combo or OASW gear. Fill everyone else with just sonars or OASW gear. The more OASW you bring the lower the risk of taking damage but MVP control will be harder. Bringing a (F)BB(V) will give second shelling phase but increase costs. *'5-2': [Base XP: 140-160, Node(s): C'''] Any ship that can use the Rosa K2 or submarines can level here for next to no cost. When running Rosa K2 just give them the launcher and stack your best AA guns to increase the trigger chance. Submarines won't get hit at all by the air raid so they don't require any special equipment. *5-3: [Base XP: '''200-220 / 700-750, Node(s): I - P] You are going to take damage here, you cannot prevent this. However it is one of the fastest methods to level as your flagship can achieve up to 2700xp on node P. Bring a fast fleet, flagship can be anything that isn't slow, a BBV or a CV, everyone else should be a DD with double attack setup. Please note both battles are night combat nodes make sure to bring a Star Shell. *'5-5': [Base XP: 200-250, Node(s): B'] This is a cheap method to level CLs or DDs. Although ideally one is recommended to use five or more preset slots, three will do. Recommended composition: CL or DD Flagship/1(F)BB(V)/1DD/3DE (the DD may be replaced with a CVL equipped with a Saiun to prevent Red T engagement if preferred). The Flagship should have 75+ displayed ASW and all other ships ~55 displayed ASW to ensure Flagship MVP. For Flagships that can perform OASW, you may also consider giving the 3 DEs gear that puts them at or as close to 60+ displayed ASW to potentially clear out a few subs on opening ASW while still ensuring that the Flagship deals enough damage to get MVP. The benefit of using DEs is also that their repair times are much shorter (around 15 minutes) which is usually enough time to complete a five preset cycle, leaving them available for the next turn. If your Flagship, BB or DD/CVL take critical damage, you'll have to bucket up or swap them out though. This method is also viable to level ASW capable CVLs If you have sufficient ASW Torpedo Bombers. General Tips *Leveling speed, cycling ships *Resource cost: Submarines, Destroyers and Light Cruisers have relatively low consumption. * Modernization: Improves the primary four stats of your ships. AA tends to be difficult to modernize but also the least effective for farming XP. Firepower and armor can help the most. Stats gained during modernization are lost upon remodel, so typically modernization is used after the first remodel. * For more experienced Admirals that do not need ships drops, leveling speed can also be increased by sortieing with maxed out ship slots so that you do not waste time getting new ships. * Using spare level 1 ship drops can help reduce the cost of sorties. This is usually used with the objective of focusing XP on a single ship as it takes other slots away from being able to gain XP. When the ship is heavily damaged or runs out of supplies (fuel/ammo), they can be used as modernization fodder or scrapped. ** Spare BB can be used to grant double shelling without having to resupply them. Sinking Avoid sinking ships by ending sorties if a ship is heavily damaged. Do not deploy ships that are heavily damaged. Ships entering a new node at Medium damage will not sink, having flagship heavily damaged during sortie will force your fleet return to base and needs immediate repair/change to continue. Submarines as tanks Submarines draw fire from all ships that can target it (DD, CL) This helps to prevent damage to other ships and lowers your repair costs as submarines have very low repair costs. Early on, submarines can be obtained through construction or on the map 1-5. They have low sortie costs. Morale considerations Morale affects ship performance like accuracy and evasion which can affect rank and help influence MVP -CVL preemptive strike is not influenced by morale Experience Mechanics Tips to Maximize Experience *Flagship gives 50% extra XP. *MVP gives double XP. Can be combined with Flagship bonus for total of 3x bonus. *MVP is awarded to the ship that does the most total damage with ties going to ship in highest slot. * S rank gives 20% extra XP; C/D- ranks have XP penalty *Placing a ship at flagship and achieving MVP grants the most XP. This is useful for quickly leveling up a single ship or focusing XP on more resource expensive ships to reduce the resource costs of leveling it up. *Night battle can increase rank and resulting XP. This is recommended for losing ranks (C-) but not for winning ranks (B+). Night battles increase fatigue and cost 1 bar of ammo. An exception can be when you want to give your flagship another chance to get MVP. * For a combined fleet, entering the night battle will automatically reset the damage dealt by the first fleet, which means the flagship of first fleet will get MVP by default. Difference between HQ XP and Ship XP *HQ XP and ship XP are different things. *HQ XP increases the most when you achieve victory at a boss node. * Earlier on, It can help to try to reduce HQ XP gain as certain maps like event maps can get more difficult at certain HQ tiers. * More details on the topic can be found on the Experience and Rankings page. Equipment Configuration Artillery Spotting * Artillery spotting helps increase the chances of doing damage and the amount of damage done. * Achieve air superiority in air phase to utilize it. * Double attack, Mixed and Cut-in will vary damage outputs (trigger chances and multiplIers). * Typically put Double attack (with Radar) or Mixed (AP) on the ship you want to MVP. * Common Double Attack Setup: ( ) * Cut-in setup can be good for supporting ships as it helps boost accuracy and damage slightly but does not have chance for high amounts of damage like the other modes. ( ) Carrier Equipment Configuration * Torpedo bombers tend to do more damage on average. * Dive bombers have more consistent damage. * Both contribute similar amounts to shelling damage (Dive bomb stat adds +2 firepower and Torpedo stat adds 1.5 firepower). * You can place torpedo bombers on a carrier you want to MVP, and weaker or less bombers on other carriers. * A Saiun on any carrier avoids getting T crossed (both sides do much less damage). It is often useful to help you achieve consistent results. Formation * Formations can help you achieve the best results. Double line reduces firepower but can help if you are having issues with accuracy (Carriers tend to be less accurate in shelling). * Formations can also be used to help influence damage and be used to help certain ships be more likely to achieve MVP. Range Range determines which ships attack first. This can be influenced by the range of equipment such as SCAMP and secondary guns. Increasing the range can help influence which ships have a better chance of MVP. Other ways to level *'PvP - can give high amounts of XP with no need to repair and low HQ xp gained. **Only refreshes twice a day for a maximum of 10 opponents per day. **Targeted admiral might change his or her fleet composition while you are initiating attack. **Different ship types may appear with various base XP gain depending on battle rank achievement and total level of 2 first ships on your opponent fleet. **Having CT, i.e. and/or , in your fleet provides additional XP after each battle which helps in leveling multiple ships at the same time. It is not mandatory to put them as the flagship but doing so increase XP gain rate **Especially recommended to high resources consumption ships, like Yamato-Class or Vittorio Veneto-Class Battleships, as it is the most resource efficienct way to level them and placing them in flagship position would not be hard to obtain MVP. **However other players could have leave low level ships in their fleet's flagship position which would result in very low experience gain. Experience gain from PVP are calculatable from various calculators available online. **It's not recommended to attack admirals that have a same or lower HQ level. You might gain few EXP after PvP-ing with them. **There are nice admirals who puts one his or her favourite ship as a flagship or admirals who only put submarines on his or her fleet. Try PvP-ing them and you'll get a sparkled fleet if you succeeded PvP-ing them! ***However, beware of someone who put his or fleet with strong AA or AACI ships (Fubuki Kai Ni, Shigure Kai Ni, Maya Kai Ni or tons of CV/CVL) in their fleet. It is not recommended to attack them with your CV/CVL, as you will suffer severe 'consequences: lose tons of sacred bauxite for resupplying your fallen planes, your bombers lose their proficiency. Proceed at your own risk! ***Since the update of April 22 2019 when you use Aircrafts in PvP, even if the Aircrafts are Shot Down, you will no longer lose the Aircraft Proficiency on the Aircraft used during the PvP. *'Expeditions - Can be a source of XP for lower level ships. **Expeditions 22, 23, 32 focus on XP instead of resources, but these specific expeditions are not recommended in general as they are very slow and resource inefficient as well as taking away the use of a fleet in gathering resources. **These expeditions can be considered if you are less active, don't need so much resources, or can spare a fleet to run them. **You don't need to worry how to level weak or difficult ships using expeditions. **Sparkling can help achieve Great Success, which doubles the XP gain ***It can be useful to combine leveling with sparkling to help increase your resources. ***Normal success and Great Success have a chance (~50% ?) to grant double XP. **Failure grants normal XP with no chance of double XP. ***You can send not fully resupplied ships to expeditions for failure as long as they have a single bar of fuel and ammo to reduce resupply costs. (Probably not worth the xp loss for cheaper cost ships) **Katori's expedition (32) is a good way to level up your low-level ships. However, this expedition takes one day to complete. References Category:Tutorial